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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24824032">Ward exchange</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dizzydino/pseuds/Dizzydino'>Dizzydino</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Multi, No Beta, Tags May Change, but things have panned out different, ethari is a good uncle, school au thing, set in the original universe, surprise! ya going shopping, things may get dark in places</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 03:40:06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>18,155</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24824032</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dizzydino/pseuds/Dizzydino</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>As part of the landmark peace deal between Zadia and the human kingdoms, Prince callum is sent to School in zadia.<br/>Needless to say, not everyone is pleased to have him there.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Callum/Rayla (The Dragon Prince), Ethari/Runaan (The Dragon Prince)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>68</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
Rayla of sliver grove slammed her head against the wall in frustration.<br/>
</p><p>
The innocent little slip of paper sitting on her desk, detailing the change in schedule of her classes that was apparently starting… today.<br/>
Which meant, in the frankest terms, she had about half an hour to make it across campus to the main meeting/lecture hall for the weekly assembly, which some smartass had decided to move forward half an hour today.<br/>
And she was not even dressed.<br/>
Nor had she eaten.<br/>
</p><p>
Needless to say that she was not in a very good mood as she swept the stuff she would need for today into her well loved backpack, and bolted downstairs, stopping only to give Ethari a good morning hug and to swipe some of his breakfast. Then she raced out the door, into the morning sun, and made for the campus.<br/>
Being trained the way she was, to be fast, agile and surefooted, the fasted way to get between the village that served as housing for the campus staff and personnel and the actual school campus was to cut through a small, yet dense patch of forest that bordered the arts building and the horticulture greenhouses, then to make a sharp left down past the sports pavilion into the main square, past the cafeteria building and into the auditorium.<br/>
On a good day, this would take her 15 minutes tops, which would leave 5 minuets to make it look like she did not just assassin her way across campus.<br/>
</p><p>
Thankfully, this was a very good day, and she made it in 10<br/>
She skidded to a halt, panting lightly, at the foot of the steps to the main auditorium, and merged into the crowd of elves making their way. no one gave her a second glance as she let her heart rate and breathing drop back down to a resting pace.<br/>
This assembly better be good.<br/>
</p><p>
--
</p><p>
Rayla had attended, well, several assemblies in the past 3 weeks. The Auditorium was a grand space, filled with benches for sitting, some of the best acoustics going and a stage front and centre, was slowly filling with sleepy students, and some slightly disgruntled members of staff, including her own beloved grump of an uncle, who had been asked by the campus head to bring some of his assassins to act as an extra layer of security around the campus.<br/>
Not that any of them were complaining about things. after the last, frankly ill stared mission, this was practically a vacation. The school payed them a good wage, provided housing, and Rayla was even given the option of attending classes, which she did take up, if just to stave off some boredom.<br/>
</p><p>
Everyone had been on edge since that human king had brought down the king of the dragons over the winter.<br/>
Old Cassie back home had not let her grandkids outside for a month, in fear of some dark mage snatching them away, despite living in a hidden village, complete with an illusion barrier.<br/>
But now it was spring (ish) and a new school year had begun, and there was rumblings about peace deals being made out of Lux Aurea and other places of power, so at least there was that, right?<br/>
</p><p>
Rayla scooted over to sit next to were Runaan was standing.<br/>
“mornin’. any clue to why we have all been dragged in here earlier than usual?”<br/>
</p>

<p>
Runaan softly shrugged his shoulders.<br/>
“no idea.”<br/>
</p>

<p>
Down on the stage, the principle was calling for quite so he could start speaking.<br/>
And if Rayla was honest, she zoned out part way through the opening speech. The principle was a kindly older chap, an earthblood with a strong resemblance to the leafy oaks that made up part of the auditorium structure, but could waffle on for ages if allowed too. And oh, how he was waffling.<br/>
</p>

<p>
Rayla resisted the urge to let her eyes droop, and instead decided to spy on her fellow students, who were (disappointingly) all doing normal teenaged things, which teenager are liable to do when dragged out of bed too early for there tastes and made to sit through a lot of dry babbling. A lot of others were nodding off, or drinking suspicious looking caffeinated drinks or just staring in to space.<br/>
Rayla could feel herself switching off again.<br/>
</p><p>
A sharp poke to the ribs from Runaan brought her back to her senses.<br/>
Apparently the principal had gotten to the point of his speech.<br/>
</p><p>
“….. to put it bluntly, my dear fellows, we have a new student joining our ranks today! Now, I’m sure you have all heard of the peace talks that are currently underway with the human kingdoms.” He paused to let the muttered affirmatives pass “good. Good. Now, this new student is attending as part of the talks under way. Callum, dear, would you like to join me up here?”<br/>
</p><p>
Rayla felt her eyes go wide as Runaan stiffened beside her, and the hall around her burst into life with gasps and whispers. the slim figure in a blue jacket that shyly appeared next to the principle was no elf. Brow hair, rounded ears, no horns to be seen.<br/>
</p><p>
She had never seen a live human before. Only in books and in the from of mounted skeletons in the Highgrove museum.<br/>
the boy, clearly tense, gave a polite greeting, before stepping back to allow the principle to finish his speech about the reasons behind why he was here. She could see him scanning the audience of gobsmacked teenaged elves, a lot of them his own age, and wounded what was going on in that skull of his.<br/>
And if he could feel the death glare that Runaan was shooting him.<br/>
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Callum felt like a tethered lamb being led in front of an army of wolves.<br/>
An army of wolves that could use magic.<br/>
</p><p>
Callum tried his hardest to swallow down the fear building in his chest.<br/>
If any of those elves out there in the audience figured out who he was, he was as good as dead. It had only been a matter of what? 5 months tops since His step father, King Harrow of Katolis had brought down him mothers killer, the king of dragons, thunder. or Avizandum, as the elves called him.<br/>
That was, to be blunt, a highly unpopular move in zadia, no matter how much of a hero it made him in the eyes of the human kingdoms.<br/>
</p><p>
Then Callum himself had manged the impossible. He had taught himself primal magic! The look on Harrow’s face when callum had made it snow in the throne room, no less then a month after the kings return from Zadia, would be one that Callum would treasure forever.<br/>
</p><p>
But then the assassins happened.<br/>
Then the Moonshadow elf assassins happened, and His little family had nearly been torn apart at the point of a sword.<br/>
</p><p>
It was a relief when the peace talks started, and he had actually been kind of excited to be able to learn magic in zadia, but now he was facing a bit of a reality check.<br/>
The kindly earthblood, professor Archie, as he had been introduced, was a calming presence to be stood beside, but he could feel the eyes on him, curiosity and more than just a bit of malice. His heart was beating like the wings of the hummingbirds back in the walled flower garden, and his throat was threatening to close up again.<br/>
To top it off, the scaring under his scarf was starting to itch<br/>
</p><p>
Thankfully he had managed to say the rehearsed greeting, and was not needed to speak again afterwards. Once Professor archie had finished his speech, he was quickly ushered back into the green room behind the stage as the last of the days announcements were read out.<br/>
Callum found a wall, and slumped against it. The last months events were getting to him.<br/>
Breath, the voice in his head told him. Air in, air out. In. out. No need for a panic attack now. His arcanum flared briefly with in him, and the next breath out scattered a couple of small snowflakes, and a small crackle of lightning, across the floor as a figure came into view.<br/>
</p><p>
Marcos, one of the two crown guard assigned to him, knelt down to look into his face.<br/>
“are you ok, my prince?” there was no masking the concern in his voice.<br/>
“you an’t supposed to call me that here, Marcos.” Callum replied between deep lungfulls of air. It was too dangerous.<br/>
“but I’m fine, it was just a little….” The tightness in his neck that had been on the verge of cutting off his voice finally gripped, and Callum was left only making light wheezing sounds. Thankfully, he did not need his voice to speak.<br/>
-intense- he signed to Marcos, looking defeated.<br/>
Marcos chuckled lightly.<br/>
“I think that’s an understatement”<br/>
</p><p>
Outside, in the hallway that lead back out into the plaza, they could start to here the sounds of a lot of feet and talking, as the auditorium emptied out, spilling students and staff back out into the morning sun.<br/>
Callum had a good idea to what, or more importantly, who they were talking about. And he was not excited about it.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
Rayla filed out of the auditorium and into the too bright morning.
</p><p>
The crowd around her was buzzing over the big announcement. A human! A real like, flesh and blood human, at their school! And he was going to be attending class with them?<br/>
It seemed unreal. So very, very unreal.<br/>
Most of the elves around her sounded curious over anything else. It was interesting for Rayla to listen to.
</p><p>
Runaan, on the other hand,  looked absolutely livid.
</p><p>
The moment that he exited the auditorium, he spun on his heals and stalked down the side of the building, towards the admin offices, where the principal would most probably be heading. Judging by the thunderstorm brewing over his head, Runaan was going to tear the elf who let the human in a new one.<br/>
Rayla felt sorry for whoever that was. Runnan was a intimidating elf at the best of times, and was downright terrifying at the worst.<br/>
</p><p>
Rayla made the very wise decision to put some distance between her and the impending explosion, and headed off to class.<br/>
In the opposite direction. 
</p><p>
The campus was set up a bit like a clock face, with the auditorium at about 5 o clock, the sports pavilion at roughly 10 o’clock and the building she needed to be in at the 11 oclock mark.
In the centre of the clock so to speak, in the middle of a vast circular courtyard, was a giant tree, trunk beautifully carved to tell stories from the different elven tribes. She stopped by one of the roots, and ran her fingers along one of the carvings near the very bottom of the tree. The story those carvings was the judgment of the moon, a story that every elf was told as little children.<br/>
The humans being driven out of Xaida had been carved to look almost demonic compared to the elves. 
</p><p>
She swiftly turned away, and headed towards her classroom, not wanting to connect the boy on the stage to the carvings on the tree, or the demons that haunted her sleep.
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Xadian history was , in theory, a pretty dry class. Lots of textbook reading and researching about events and battles gone by.
</p><p>
There were field trips lined up for later on in the year that the whole class were looking forward too, though. The mention of at least one outing to lux alia to see visit the war museum there had definitely peaked Rayla’s interest, so she was determined to stick with the class until then at least.<br/>
She could bring back so many weapon ideas for Ethari to try to make.<br/>
</p><p>
It was not just the promise of future outings that made Rayla kind of enjoy this class, it was the fact that over the past 3 weeks since the start of the school year, she had made some friends!<br/>
They made an odd bunch, admittedly.
</p><p>
“I’m telling you! My uncle says he came face to face with some when he got tangled up in there fishing nets!” Mina, A bubbly aqua haired tide bound elf protested to the rest of the table.<br/>
“and they just let him go? Hate to tell ya this meeps, but I think he was pulling ya leg.” Tobius, a skywing who might as well be a (short) storm cloud personified, ruffled his wings.<br/>
“humans don’t have that kind of compassion.”<br/>
“bet they do.” Mina stuck her tongue out at him over her text book.<br/>
Tobius returned the gesture.
</p><p>
Rayla and Arctium, a soft spoken earthblood elf, locked eyes in a silent look of amusement. They were meant to be reading up about the judgment of the moon, a subject that would lead on to the first test of the year, but of course, it had brought up the subject of humans, which had lead into chatting about the one that had (legally) appeared on campus, which then had naturally moved on to the stories that each of them had heard about humans form varying family members.<br/>
Whilst pretending to study.<br/>
Like good students.<br/>
</p><p>
“my gramps used to tell all us kids that humans have black blood due to all the dark magic they use, that it rot from the inside out, even from a young age.” Arctium kept his voice soft, so the professor could not hear them. 
“ummmm…” memories of darkness and a black eyed, grinning human mage popped into her head, along with the sound of a fight and Runaan yelling at her to run. She shuddered.<br/>
“nothing that you guys haven’t heard before.”<br/>
</p><p>
The rest of the table all looked at each over, clearly not believing her in the slightest, but they did not press any further with the matter. 
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Rayla’s day went downhill from there.
</p><p>
After Xadian history, she had sports. She liked sports, and was very good at sports, but the sunfire coach that she had to put up with seemed to have something against moonshadow elves in general. After 3 weeks, he was still referring to her as ‘the moon elf’ despite referring to the rest of the 13 or so teens in the class by name.<br/>
The others had called him out on it repeatedly, but any protests fell on death ears.<br/>
Then, to top it off, when she got to the cafeteria for lunch, early so to miss the crowds, she found that the little pouch of meal tokens that she had had vanished from her bag at some point, despite being very sure that she had packed it in her backpack that morning on her way out.
</p><p>
In fact the dang thing rarely left her bag, so where the hell was it?
</p><p>
She was still rummaging around in her bag and cussing up a storm when she felt a presence behind her. her training kicked in, and she spun around to meet the person who had snuck up on her, only to come face to face with the last person she expected to see about campus.<br/>
The human jumped back in surprise, what ever he was going to say to her dying on his lips.<br/>
</p><p>
“what do you want?” she hissed.<br/>
He stuttered in surprise, wide eyed.<br/>
“what?” she demanded “never seen a moon elf before?”<br/>
“I…i..”<br/>
</p><p>
He was still stammering, and looked rather stunned. At her tone? At her looks? She did not give a damn about the opinions of a human. and unfortunately for him, she had some anger to get out.<br/>
“What are you staring at? My horns? Ears?” the human was backing away now.<br/>
“here’s some advice for ya. Go. away.” She snapped at him, spinning on heel to stalk back across the courtyard, fully planning on retracing her steps and finding her sodding token pouch.<br/>
“… you have nice ears?” was the only thing that he could come out with as she marched off.
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Callum staired after the elf.
</p><p>
She had been… rude. 
</p><p>
He looked down at the pouch that he had been trying to return to her, the same one that he had spotted falling out of an open pocket on her bag.<br/>
It.. would most probably not be the best of ideas to try and chase after her. she might actually rip his neck out if he did.<br/>
Which left him in a pickle. The pouch, and the tokens inside, were not his, and he was pretty sure that that other moonshadow on the security team was looking for any reason to try to kick him out of the school. Being caught with someone else’s stuff, without the permission of that someone, would probably do it.<br/>
</p><p>
It did not help at all that he could of sworn that he had seen that particular moonelf before from.. somewhere.<br/>
And he doubted that that somewhere was any of the peace talks.
</p><p>
At a loss, and starting to grow weary of the growing number of teen elves that were appearing in search of food, he decided to seek out the first teacher he could, and turn the pouch, plus contents in to them post haste.<br/>
Thankfully, the first teacher he found was the kindly moonshadow who was running one of the crafting workshops. He had been introduced to Callum as Ethari whilst Callum had been taking a facilities tour, and had been openly friendly to the very bewildered teen being dragged about. He would be as good as a choice as ever to talk to.<br/>
Nor did he mind having his lunch disturbed.
</p><p>
“I found this in the courtyard, and tried to return it to its owner but…”<br/>
“she blew you off?”<br/>
“…. Rudely, Yes.”<br/>
Ethari chuckled and accepted to pouch from Callum.<br/>
“I know the young lady in question. I’ll get it back to her, don’t you worry.”  He tucked the pouch into his own bag, sitting next to him on the shady bench. Then he looked up at Callum with a slightly concerned look in his face.<br/>
“Aren’t you meant to have a guard with you?”<br/>
</p><p>
It took Callum a second to compute that he may of left Soren alone in the courtyard, as Callum had rushed after the young moonelf without saying a word, or giving a reason. Granted, both Soren and Marcos had ‘don’t mind me’ spells on them, which meant that the student body as a whole (minus Callum and some of the staff) would just ignore their presence unless directly interacting with them, but this was Soren and Marcos he was talking about.
</p><p>
One was a trouble magnet and the other was …. Soren.
</p><p>
“I think you best get back to them, before anyone gets any ideas about kidnapping them.”<br/>
Callum snapped back to reality somewhat.<br/>
“good idea… thank you again!”<br/>
“no problem! Now go save them.”<br/>
Callum waved a goodbye as he jogged back to the approximate location of Soren, praying that the well meaning but a little dense blond had not gotten into mischief whilst he was gone.<br/>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
Rayla’s mood had gone from steaming to completely fuming by the time she made it back to the house she shared with her uncles.<br/>
Not only had her pouch not turned up, despite back peddling all the way back to her classroom, but by the time she had nabbed a couple of tokens off of Runaan and gotten back to the cafeteria, the place was packed and all the good stuff was gone.<br/>
She had scowled through her afternoon lessons, spooking more than one of her fellow students, and continued her grump all the way home.
</p>
<p>
By the time she got back, Ethari was already home, and puttering around the small kitchen that came with the small two story earthblood style house that they were staying in.<br/>
Interestingly, so was Runaan, who had taken over about 75% of the kitchen table to clean his bow blade in the passive aggressive manner that he reserved for when he was ticked off about something (the human, if Rayla had to guess), but was also not in the mood to vent to someone. And the look on his face as he wiped at a nonexistence blemish on the mirror like metal warned off any attempts at small talk right now.<br/>
Both her uncles looked up from what they were doing as she entered through the open kitchen door, her best glow toad expression still etched onto her face. They both greeted her, one a lot more chirpy than the other, then went back to what they were doing.
</p>
<p>
Well, Runaan went back to cleaning his immaculate bow blade, now grumbling lightly, whilst Ethari grabbed something of the counter, and followed Rayla though to the lounge, dropping a kiss on top of his husbands head as he went past.<br/>
</p>
<p>
Rayla was slumped on the sofa as he walked in, grumbling about everything and anything. She had shucked off her boots, dumped out the home work she had acquired that day, and was just staring moodily up at the ceiling.<br/>
</p>
<p>
“rough day?” Ethari asked softly, sitting down next to her.<br/>
“you could say that.” She muttered.<br/>
“what to talk about it?” Ethari asked, reaching over to gently start braiding her dishevelled white hair.<br/>
“not really. Well, kinda? That sports coach was being an ass. Again. You’d think he had something against me or.. something.  And I lost my token pouch.”<br/>
There was a small smile starting to creep onto her face as Ethari’s fingers deftly braided small braids into her hair. It was impossible to be completely grumpy when Ethari was around. 
“did you now?” He asked, finishing a third braid and started a forth.<br/>
“yup. Must of left it somewhere. Even went to lost property. Annnnnd I now owe Runaan lunch.” She huffed.<br/>
</p>
<p>
Ethari shook his head at this, and reached into one of his pockets. He retrieved the pouch that was inside and dangled it In front of her nose.<br/>
“This token pouch, by any chance?”<br/>
Rayla stared at it, then at Ethari in disbelief.<br/>
“what? where was it?” she asked<br/>
“Well, the strangest thing happened over lunch. A very nice young man found it and handed it over to me. Apparently he tried to give it back to you after it fell out of your bag, but you nearly bit his head off. Ring a bell?”
</p>
<p>
Rayla furrowed her eyebrows in confusion, running over the days events in her mind until she remembered the human boy approaching her at lunch, and the pieces clicked into place.<br/>
Oh.<br/>
<i>Opps. <i><br/>
Rayla winced.<br/>
“I was an ass, wasn’t I”  she stated flatly.<br/>
“just a little ray, just a little.”
</i></i></p>
<p>
  <i>
    
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
    <i>
-
</i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
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  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
    <i>

<i>The night was dark. The trees were blocking the moon and there was the sickly, metallic sent of blood in the air.<br/>
</i></i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
    <i>
      
    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
    <i>
      <i>
Rayla was running. 
</i>
    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
Running through the too dark trees, feeling the thick, sticky mud of the forest floor gripping to her boots as she ran. Somewhere behind her, monstrous creatures made of smoke howled as they gave chase.<br/>
Behind them, looming large with glossy black eyes and blood stained hands, the dark mage that had set them loose on them laughed a twisted laugh.<br/>
Runaan had been right there beside her, but he was now missing.<br/>
The others had fallen behind them.<br/>
There had been screaming.<br/>
The smoke creatures had ripped them to shreds.<br/>
It was all she could do to run, run, run and pray to the lady of the moon that she could escape.<br/>
Then, as if fate was mocking her, She tripped over a craggy root sticking out of the mud, leaving her spiralled out on the floor, and the mud held her fast, dragging her down, choking her as the beasts thundered up behind her.<br/>
Rayla let out a garbled scream as they fell on her, teeth flashing. 
</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
    <i>
      
    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
    <i>
      <i>
Rayla sat bolt upright.
</i>
    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
    <i>
      
    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
    <i>
      <i>
It took her a moment to calm her racing heart and realise that she was safe in her nice soft, bed, far far away from the events of her nightmares. Or the twisted memories that those nightmares liked to spawn from.<br/>
She groaned and flopped back, peering over at the moon moth themed clock on her bedroom wall. It was just going midnight.<br/>
She had only been asleep for two hours at the most.<br/>
And now her brain was way too frazzled for sleep anyway.<br/>
The sky outside was clear, and she could see the crescent moon that hung in the sky, its warming light providing some soft comfort after the terror her mind had just put her through. It was just a dream, it told her, a twisted reflection of something that did not happen that way.<br/>
Rayla stared out the window, at the dark woods and the lights of the campus behind them.<br/>
she needed to go for a run.
</i>
    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
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    </i>
  </i>
</p>
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</i>
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    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
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      <i>
slipping on some light clothing and shoes, over her pyjamas, she headed out.<br/>
</i>
    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
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    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>
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      <i>
Her uncles were soundly asleep as she snuck out of her room. She could hear Ethari’s light snoring from behind the closed door with the silly ‘forget the moonstrider, beware the husband’ sign hanging from the doorknob.<br/>
Runaan hated that sign, but Ethari had threatened to paint a larger, gaudier copy on the front door if anything happened to the sign.<br/>
The sign stayed.<br/>
</i>
    </i>
  </i>
</p>
<p>
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She crept down the stairs, and to the door, remembering to grab her copy of the house key off the key hooks, and slipping out into the cool night air.<br/>
She took a deep breath, breathing in the smells of the small potted flower garden, the damp stonework of the house and path, and the fresh woods in front of her. she breathed out, and ran.<br/>
She zig zagged through the small patch of woods, bouncing off the trees and ground with no specific path in mind, just letting her mind take her where ever until she popped out the other side onto the sleeping campus beyond. Despite having been living here for at least a month now, she had never bothered to stray onto he campus proper at night before. The lamps that lit the pathways were still on, and so were some of the lights in the buildings, but apart from that the whole place was a ghost town. Still, quite, and ready to be used as an obstacle course.
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Rayla took off again, hopping over the fence to the running track and bolting for the single story sports pavilion. She ran to the first solid wall she came across, and used the vines growing on it as handhelds to shimmy up the side, to the roof. Then she darted across the roof, avoiding the skylights, and used the top of the awning above the front entrance as a spring board, to propel herself into one of the skinny elms that bordered that part of the courtyard.<br/>
she perched there for a couple of minuets, watching the courtyard intently for any signs of movement.<br/>
there was none, so she hopped down onto the smooth pavement.
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The unity tree was lit up in front of her with lanterns in its branches and some glowing sunfire orb lights on pedestals around the base. She could pick out the carvings on the tree even better in this lighting than she could in the day, like a huge 3D story book.<br/>
She sat under the unity tree for a bit, spiralled out on one of the benches, watching the glowing pollen spores that the tree's blooms let out drift in the night air. She had had her run. it was a nice run.
..but now what?<br/>
She gazed lazily around the quiet campus, wondering what to do next. She was pretty sure that the library was not open at this hour, so picking up the next book in the ‘legends of  Garlath’  series that she was reading was a no go.<br/>
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<p>
  <i></i>
    <i><i></i></i>
Across the way, the stately, sod roofed, admin building sat quietly in front of her. the only lights that were on were the ones that she knew, because Runaan had told her, was the principal’s personal apartment.   Something, something, better to keep an eye on things, something. Then she looked again. There, on the top floor, was another light, lighting up a window around the side of building. A light that was on the opposite side of the building than the aforementioned apartment.<br/>
Which probably should not be on.<br/>
Unless someone had been forgetful and left it on, but hey, It deserved some investigation at least. 

  
</p>
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Rayla hopped lightly to her feet and made for the building
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  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
The window that the light was coming from was on the 3ed floor, the top floor. It was stupidly easy to climb up the side of the building, using the decorative stonework as hand and foot holds, and using the second story window ledge to volt up to the suspect window.
</p><p>
She crouched on the window sill, cupped her hands to the window and peered inside.
</p><p>
It was a bedroom. Simple, yet well appointed bedroom. The light was coming from a small lamp sitting on a writing desk across from the bed. Apart from the bed, desk and chair, and a wardrobe in the corner, the room was empty. <br/>
she had heard whispers that there was another apartment in the admin building, apart from principal Archie’s, and it looked like she had found it. But… who was staying here? A guest speaker? Some dignity or such scouting out the school for their spawn next year? <br/>
She continued peering, trying to spot anything that would give away the rooms occupants when a sudden movement by the door made her jump a little. <br/>
A shortish, thin figure, with no horns, yawing sleepily as they meandered over to the bed from the door, dragging their feet. <br/>
</p><p>
Oh. <i>Oh.</i></p><p>
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    <i>
It was the human. the human who she could not remember the name of for the life of her. the human that she was meant to say sorry to for the way she acted earlier that day. or yesterday. Depends on what time it was right now. <br/>
He plopped himself onto the bed, kicking off a pair of rather nice looking slippers and rubbing his eyes. <br/>
Rayla lent against the window, apparently unnoticed by the sleepy human. he looked harmless enough, just a kid her own age, with  but Runaan was always harping on about how humans were untrustworthy by nature and so on. 
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And then there had been that mage……. Oh lady luna that mage. He had been so <i>ordinary<i> looking before he had attacked. 
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If Rayla had been paying attention to more than the person she way spying on, she would of noticed something a little odd about the window she was leaning against. When the building was constructed, this particular window had been installed wrong, by complete accident, meaning that instead of opening outwards like the rest of the windows in the building did, this one opened inwards. And since it had been a pleasant evening, the latch was open.
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So, as she lent against the window, it swung open, dumping Rayla onto the bedroom floor with as much grace and posture as a dropped bag of potatoes.
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She scrambled to her feet, sending an accusatory glare at the traitorous wood rimed sheet of glass, only to realise how quite it had suddenly become in the room. <br/>
Slowly, she turned towards the bed and locked eyes with a now very awake and very, very panicked looking human. <br/>
They stared at each over blankly for a couple of seconds, each unsure of how to act at the sudden presence of the other. <br/>
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Then the human tried to bolt for the door.
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In a move that would make Runaan proud, Rayla vaulted over the end of the bed, and tackled the lanky boy back onto the bed with a wump, pinning him down so he could not run off, and clamped one hand over the boys mouth. She ended up crouched over him, straddling his tummy. She could feel his panicked breathing as bright forest green eyes locked onto her violet ones. <br/>
And then realised that she had idea what to do next.
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Ok, she had made sure that he could not scream or yell or run away, but she had failed to plan out what she was going to do next. <br/>
So, with her head completely empty of ideas, she fell back on the only thing she could do. She started to talk.
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-
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Callum had no clue what was going on.
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One moment he was dragging himself off to bed, after saying goodnight to Soren and Marcos, and ruminating over the rather exciting day that they had had between them, and the next there was a rather pretty young moonelf tumbling into his room via the bedroom window. 
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Ok, a very pretty moonelf. A very pretty moonelf who had pinned him to the bed before he could really react to, well, anything. Said moonelf was now straddling him, hand clamped over his mouth and babbling out an apology for.. something she had done. Apparently. At some point that day. <br/>
Her face was locked into that panicked look that people got on their face when they had backed themselves into a corner of sorts. Oh, how he knew that look. He had both seen and worn that face in the past an awful lot. 
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As the adrenaline faded from his system, and the aching memories of a blade shining in cold moonlight was beaten back to the dark recesses of his mind, he realised that he recognised this handsy babbling moonelf.
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Oh, right, from that lunch time. uh. Well then.
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She continued to blabber on and on, hand still over his mouth. Callum was starting to realise that it was becoming slightly hard to breath. Just so slightly. Which was now starting to become problematic, since his throat starting was starting to hurt, and hurt a lot. <br/>
A memory from earlier that day, watching Soren and Marcos spar. Wiggling his arm out from where it was pinned, being careful not to spook this elf, and tapped her side. She stopped her talking and looked at where he had tapped her in confusion. So, he tapped her side again, with a bit more force. It was a signal in sparing, used when you are pinned down, to ask your sparring partner to let off.
He prayed she understood. 
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And thank the stars, she did.
The hand restricting his airway was removed and he gasped, took an deep, deep breath. He looked up at her.
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“apology accepted. .. Um, could you get off please” Callum winced internally at how rough his voice sounded, and he could taste the tiniest bit of blood in the mouth. <br/>
She gaped for a moment, then seemed to realise the.. slightly suggestive way that she was straddling him. She went tomato red, and scrabbled off of him, muttering even more apologies as she did. She scooted to the other end of the bed, letting him sit up in bed. <br/>
She refused to make eye contact with him, face getting redder then he had ever seen someone’s face go before hand she seemed to want to look at anything but him. <br/>
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Then, before he could say anything to her, she bolted right out of the window she fell in, without a sound. <br/>
He bolted out of bed and rushed to the window, afraid to see what the results of some one jumping out a 3ed story window was, only to catch a glimpse of white hair disappearing into the shadows of the court yard, off in the direction of the sports pavilion and beyond. <br/>
“well.” He said to himself after a while. “so that just happened.” 
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-
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Rayla did not stop running until she was safely back in the deep shadows of the woods, with in bolting distance of her front door.<br/>
Her face was flaming in shear embarrassment. <br/>
She was stupid. So, so stupid. <br/>
She slumped down against one of the trees and put her head in her hands and let out a huge sigh.<br/>
Please, please, please, dear sweet merciful lady in the moon, she prayed, please don’t let that human end up in any of her classes. <br/>
Please.
</i>
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</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>a bit of angst for the first part of this chapter, with some passing descriptions of a life threatening injury. juuuuust a heads up.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
<b>-3 months prior, (2 months and 2 days after winter’s turn) -</b>
</p>
<p>
  
Prince Callum of Katolis walked in a daze, eyes half glazed, desperately truing to hang on to the wiggling bundle in his arms.

</p>
<p>
  
It had been two days since the failed assassination attempt on the king- his step dad. A man that Callum was lucky to have in his life, and a man that Callum was very lucky to be able to call dad again.<br/>
It had been two days since the assassins, and since he had put himself between one of the elves and his baby brother.<br/>
Two days since a blade was slashed across his neck, nearly severing his vocal cords completely. The physician on staff, a wonderful man that had looked after him since the day he had arrived in the castle as a little kid, had managed to save his life, and was pretty certain that, given time and medication, he would make a full recovery.

</p>
<p>
  
He should not be up and about. He was supposed to be on strict bed rest, with minimal movement.<br/>
But here he was, completely throwing all of that out of the window.

</p>
<p>
  
He needed to see his dad, the king. Right now.

</p>
<p>
  
Ezren was right next to him, acting as his voice when people acted shocked at the sight of him, at the sight of what was swaddled up in his arms. Callum was pretty sure that he was stating to bleed through the bandages on his neck too, which was probably not helping the reactions of the servants and guards they passed.<br/>
It felt like was floating slightly by the time he made it to the imposing wooden doors of the throne room.<br/>
Soren and Claudia were already there, heads hung. There father was in some hot water for his actions two nights prior, and was most likely being reamed out by king harrow and the council at the moment. Claudia’s makeup was running, she had been crying, but he could not tell what for.<br/>
</p>
<p>
 
Was it was fear for her father? Most likely.

</p>
<p>
  
Soren looked a mess too, eyes red with tears. Callum prayed that they would not be punished for their fathers actions, especially considering what he was about drop on them.

</p>
<p>
  
“we need to speak to dad” Ezren announced to the guards at the door. “now, please! Its urgent!”<br/>
The world was starting to swim, and he could not make out the reply that the guards came out with, but Soren was right there, behind him in a flash, holding him up.<br/>
The smile that he tried to give in response came out as more of a grimace, but Soren seemed to get the message anyway.<br/>
</p>
<p>
 
Then there was movement, fuzzy, fast movement. And then suddenly He was standing in the sun drenched throne room, with the entire council staring at him in disbelief.<br/>
The king was trying to talk to him, a look of concern on his face, but Callum’s brain was so warped from the medicine and the fact that he was not meant to be up that he could barely make out what was being said to him. He just shuffled the ball of blankets around in his arms for a moment, making a little, blue, horned head pop out of the middle with a cranky chirp.<br/>
</p>
<p>
  
The silence that followed was deafening as the world spun in increasing circles.

</p>
<p>
 
Without warning, Callum felt his feet come out from under him as the world fainted away.

</p>
<p>
 
-

</p>
<p>
  
<b>Present day</b>


</p>
<p>
 
“and here is your timetable, classes start in half an hour.” The strict looking skywing elf in charge of admin gave him a cool, calculated look.<br/>
“I trust that it is not to hard for you to understand.”

</p>
<p>
  
“no ma’am.” Callum replied politely, scrutinising the thick peace of parchment in his hands, detailing the bi-weekly timetable that he had been signed up to. His eyes picked up that he had double art this morning, and botany in the afternoon, followed by a free period.

</p>
<p>
  
“good, good. You would not believe the amount of people who fail to show up to classes because apparently did not understand the time table.” She fished what looked to be a couple of short, engraved wooden bookmarks, about the length of his palm, and a stack of round silvery disks about the size of copper 2 grain bit out of one of the draws on her desk.<br/>
“... and here is your school id, two copies of” she handed the wooden tabs to him, “and some meal tokens for the cafeteria. Please don’t lose them.” the sliver disks where tipped into a small pouch that Callum immediately stashed in his bag, and looped one of the id’s onto a lanyard that had been provided.

</p>
<p>

“I will try not to, Ma’am. Thank you for your help.”<br/>
She waved him off,  the smallest of smiles on her face.<br/>
“you are very welcome. Now, you best be getting to class. Tawny is not the most strict of teachers, but they don’t like tardiness.”

</p>
<p>
  
-

</p>
<p>
  
Tawny was a willowy earthblood artist, the sort of character that Aunt Amaya might describe as a ‘Hippy’, who was more than happy to greet Callum as he entered, a good 15 minuets early, and show him to his seat in the bright and airy studio that he taught out of. Images crafted by prior students covered the walls alongside colour and lighting charts, and there was even a couple of bamboo and paper animal lanterns dangling from the ceiling.<br/>
</p>
<p>
  
Callum felt right at home.

</p>
<p>
  
Each student had there own desk, there was 12 in total in the room, 4 along, 3 deep,  walkway up the middle, and Callum’s was in the front row, first on the left.<br/>
As Callum started to do some test sketches on his new school sketchbook (separate from the one his dad gave him) the first of the other students started to file in, and head to their own desks, completely ignoring the new addition to the room.<br/>
Maybe, just maybe, this would not be so bad.<br/>
</p>
<p>
 
-

</p>
<p>

Rayla had no idea, what so ever, why she was taking art.<br/>
She had no talent in it, in her own mind, but here she was, trundling into an art class, like she did every week, and was, secretly, kind of enjoying it. Prof’ Tawny was a very laid back professor who did not put tones of pressure on his students, and let them experiment with styles and mediums to there hearts content, as long as you stuck to the brief and turned in homework, and did not cause a ruckus in class.

</p>
<p>

No wonder He and Ethari got along like a house on fire.

</p>
<p>

There was still 5 minuets to go before class officially started as she pushed the door open, saying good morning to Tawny on her way in and plopped her bag down on her desk at the front of the class and started to drag her pencil case and sketchbook out, only for the latter to snag on something, and to send her pencils flying after she gave it a hard tug to dislodge it.<br/>
</p>
<p>

Brilliant, just what she needed on this lovely morning.

</p>
<p>
 
Ducking under the desk, she scrabbled a little to round up the coloured graphite sticks as they rolled away from her.<br/>
Another hand, which was not hers, politely handed her a couple that had rolled under the desk next to hers. she started to mutter a thank you when she realised who said hand belonged to. The 5th digit on the hand was a little bit of a giveaway.<br/>
She looked at him. He looked at her. A very, very awkward feeling washed over the two of them, and Rayla refused to make eye contact with the surprised looking human. the fates were laughing at her right now. She could hear them. 

</p>
<p>
  
After an eternity, he spoke up.

</p>
<p>
  
“I think we might want to pretend that yesterday did not happen.” He said, in a soft voice, so that the rest of the still half asleep class did not pay them any mind.<br/>
“yeh… that’s a good idea” Rayla replied slowly. Tawny was speaking to someone outside the door the rest of the class was still not paying the human any mind. They sat in silence, trying not to look at each over as the class filled up around them.<br/>
“I’m Rayla.” She blurted, to try to break the tension. It was not like she could jump out a window to get away from things this time around. Best face things head on.<br/>
“ Callum” He gave her a smile, and shook her hand as Tawny made his way to the front of the class<br/>
“ Nice to meet you miss Rayla”

</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
It had taken the rest of the class a hilariously long time to realise that there was someone new in class, let alone that that someone was not a fellow elf.
</p><p>
The fact that it was first thing in the morning probably had something to do with it, and the other fact that most of the class was concentrating on whatever they were working on. But as the morning wore on, and the caffeine infused whatever that they were consuming started to kick in, it someone noticed. 
</p><p>
Rayla had to stuff the sleeve of the jumper she was wearing into her mouth to stop herself from laughing out loud at the reactions that swept through the rest of the class once the tidebound across from Callum (who Runaan was convinced smoked manaweed on campus and in the dorms, but had not actually caught him in the act yet) woke up enough to realise who was sitting across the aisle.
The double take that one sunelf in the back corner did was spectacular to say the least. <br/>
</p><p>
As it turned out, even when confronted with a class of very shocked elves, Callum the human was a snarky fella, as the memorable response to one person’s slightly panicked question of “how long has that been there?” proved <br/>
“In this class, or in the world in general?” he asked, eyes never leaving the drawing he was in the middle of.
</p><p>
Tawny had to slam a heavy refence book against his desk a couple times before the class quieted down after that.
</p><p>
But, to Rayla’s surprise, once it became apparent that the human was not causing any problems, and was not going to hurt anyone, the rest of the class settled down and got back to work, quickly being sucked back into whatever they had been working on before the ruckus started. <br/>
Apart from that one sun elf, sitting riiight behind him, who decided that repeatedly poking the back of his head was a good idea. You know. To check if he was real or not.
Which went on for at least 15 minutes until the pencil was suspiciously encased in ice. <br/>
Rayla blinked in confusion, as did the sun elf who was now looking at the rectangular block of ice with a confused air, before spinning around and starting an impromptu interrogation of the skywing behind him.
</p><p>
Who had no clue, apparently.
</p><p>
Callum ignored the decision behind him in favour of what he was drawing in his book, some sort of landscape by the looks of things. The sort with trees and a river, and little people doing things by that river. <br/>
It looked really good. 
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Art class seemed to roll on forever, but eventually, the bell for lunch rung out, and the whole class packed up and made for the door.
</p><p>
Rayla, token bag in hand this time, made it to the cafeteria in record time, and joined the que. The food was set out in a self-serve buffet sort of thing, you handed the attendant your token, grabbed your tray and plate at the start, then worked you way around the different departments, that covered most if all diets. There was a stocked salad bar, plenty of veggies, a couple of different soups (a chowder and something with veg in, by the looks of things) a grill with a couple of cooks cooking meat, fish and other niceties to order ect.. <br/>
</p><p>
Rayla happily snagged some jackalope hunches from the grill  to add to the salad and soup mix that she had pick out that day, grabbed a bottle of iced moonberry juice from the drinks cart and was browsing the deserts when an explosion of whispers alerted her that a certain exchange student was most likely now in the area as well. <br/>
Ideally, she wondered if any of the food here was the sort that humans ate. Well, there was bread, so would that do? Humans liked bread, right? <br/>
Wait, when did she even care about this? 
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Callum slunk off to the side of the seating aria, food in hand.
</p><p>
The earthblood attendant had been a cool lady, who was apparently highly amused by his existence, had merely given him pointers to the best stuff on the menu that day.<br/>
So, he had taken her advice, and was looking forward to the eclectic mix that he had picked up. Soup, some sort of flatbread, a salad, some interesting looking fruit, and some desert with berries in it.<br/>
A good hall.<br/>
He squirreled himself off to the side, and tucked into the rich fish chowder (not clam, but something similar), eating it with bites of the bread and salad. It was a slightly weird, but very good combination for a hungry teen to enjoy.
</p><p>
He was about 80% done with the chowder when a shadow fell over him.
</p><p>
Looking up, half expecting to see Soren or Marcos checking in on him, only to find a trio of elven teens leaning over him. They were clearly bigger than him, older then him, and had the sort of smiles that could only be described as ‘evil’.
</p><p>
“heyyyyy fella, what ya doing?” one drawled in a thick sunfire accent. <br/>
Callum’s mouth was full, so mentioned to his food. <br/>
“… not very chatty, are you? What, don’t wanna talk to us?” another asked <br/>
“that rude you know. Hey, fellas, what do we do to rude people?” the third, clearly the boss of the other two smirked, leaning in. “why don’t we show this rude little round ear.”
</p><p>
Before Callum could open his mouth to say anything the elf on the left grabbed the mostly empty bow of soup out of his hands and dashed it over his head, shattering the bowl, and cracking Callums’s head into the wall behind him. <br/>
Then the other dumped the fruit and remains of the salad over him before all 3 scarpered laughing at the sound of someone shouting and running over.
</p><p>
Callum’s head was spinning, just starting to resister the pain when a pair of hands grabbed his face. Blinking rapidly to try to get his yes to focus, the face of Rayla, and a small group of other elves who he did not know leaning over him, a tidebound, skywing and a frankly huge earthblood. At least they all looked concerned. <br/>
</p><p> 
“…. Bunch of jerks! Why the hell did they do that?!” the skywig huffed. <br/>
“why do you think? Hey, hon? You alright?” the tidebound waved her fingers in front of his eyes. <br/>
Another movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention. <br/>
A young, slender sunfire elf, had approached, holding something in her hand, but Callum’s still fuzzy mind could not quite make out what it was.
</p><p>
“here, I saw them take this from him when they ran off.” She seemed to be talking more to Rayla than to him “should we get a teacher? He’s bleeding.” <br/>
Was he? Callum rasie one of his hands to touch at the part of his temple that was stinging the most, and tried to groan to loudly at the sight of his bloodied fingers. Yep. He was bleeding. <br/>
The blond sunfire handed Rayla what turned out to be his bag, and the earthblood and skywing, one looking a lot calmer than the other helped him up to his feet. <br/>
Then, as a group, they helped Callum walk to the campus clinic.
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Marcos and Soren watched them go, after slipping a note into Callum’s bag telling Callum what they would be doing for a little bit. <br/>
</p><p>
They had tripped the group as they had tried to make there get away, only for the blond sunfire to scoop up Callum’s bag to return it before ever of them could make a move on it. So now that little problem was out of the way, and Callum was on his way to be taken care of, the two of them had a new job to do. <br/>
Bully hunting. <br/>
</p><p>
The trio still had Callum’s school id, after all, and it would not do to let them get away with there sick game. It would be such a shame if someone had to knock there heads together and drag them to the headmaster’s office.<br/>
 Such. A. shame. <br/>
They would check in on him once they had finished.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Friends?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
Callum sat primly on a bed in the cool, neutral toned medical ward, trying not to wince as the stocky dark skinned earthblood elf gently but very thoroughly cleaned the gash on his temple.<br/>
Thankfully for all, the cut was not too big or deep, but as the old saying goes, head wounds bleed like a bitch.
</p><p>
And, oh, did it bleed. All down the side of Callum’s face and onto his favourite jacket.
</p><p>
Callum was overly thankful that his jacket, a gift from his aunt, was made of the same marital that military tunics back in Katolis was made of, on insistence of his aunt. Stains and fluids in general came out real easily, plus the fabric was decently slash and stab resistant. <br/>
Too bad those bullies did not aim for the jacket.
</p><p>
The doctor, who had introduced himself to Callum as Dr Jimsonweed (“just call me Jimson. Everyone dose”) was humming a tuneless song as he gently dabbed a sort of liquid bandage onto to cut, pinching the sides of the cut together to seal it shut.  
</p><p>
“tTere” he said “that should do you. Now. Is anything else hurting? How’s your neck doing?”<br/>
At the confused look that Callum gave him, Jimson had to laugh a little. <br/>
“ya doc from back home sent me your medical files. Your one lucky kid” Callum had to smile at that, and after a moment tilted his chin, pulling down his scarf up so that Jimson could examine the aching scar on his neck.<br/>
It was apparent that the scar was only aching because the act of being hit in the head by a robust soup bowl had, naturally, whipped his head to one side, and the scar tissue did not like that too much. There was no apparent damage, thankfully, so he was good to go on that front. <br/>
</p><p>
He had been very lucky today, despite everything. His injuries could have been so much worse, especially if that soup bowl had been still full of piping hot soup when it had been bounced off his head. 
</p><p>
Jimson finished his exam and sat back to jot some things down on a form as Callum shrugged his jacket back on and straightened up his scarf.
</p><p>
“so, kid, you want to file a complaint against the lovely young gents that did this to you?”<br/>
Callum thought for a moment, then tried to answer, only for his voice to come out as a reedy wine. Jimson valiantly tried not to laugh at the exasperated expression on Callum’s face. <br/>
“is that a yes?” the amusement in Jimson voice was hard to hide, as was the half smile on his face<br/>
Callum huffed and nodded slowly, still pouting a little at the betrayal of his voice box. Why did this always happen to him? <br/>
“ok, ok, let me get the paperwork for you. I trust you have a pen."
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
The group that had helped him, including Rayla were all sprawled out over the well-worn future in the waiting room, talking quietly amongst themselves. If any of them had noticed that he had entered the room, they gave no sign. Callum perched himself in a corner chair away from the rest and fished his quill pen and ink out of his bag to start filling in the form that he had been given.
It was a simple enough form, name, student id, what happened ect, all things that could be filled in quickly and efficiently, despite the school id he was wearing going missing, thanks to having a picture perfect memory. Well, until he realised that he had no clue who the trio where, apart form being tall, mean and mostly sunfire. <br/>
The tall and broad one was most probably an earthblood of some disruption in retrospect, but like hell if he knew their names. 
</p><p>
So, with a small huff, he got up and headed over to Jimson’s desk to ask for another piece of parchment. <br/>
He may not know their names, but he could draw each and every one of them a nice, true to life portrait.<br/>
Juuust for them. 
</p><p>
He was finishing the second of the 3 when the relation struck him that the group was no longer talking, and the room had gone very quiet. And he had that undesirable sense that someone was standing really close to him. Peeking up from the portrait he was drawing, he found himself nose to nose with the tidebound elf lass, who was practically nose to nose with him.<br/>
He jumped back with a start and a short yelp of surprise.<br/>
</p><p>
The tidebound looked at him with big curious eyes.
</p><p>
“can.. I help you?” Callum asked, giving her a very weary look in return.<br/>
She tilted her head to one side like an inquisitive dog, curious about something. The moment that Callum opened his mouth to ask, again, to what this curious young elf wanted, she darted her hands forward to grab at his face.
</p><p>
“you don’t have black eyes. I thought all humans had black eyes.” She chirped.
“wha..?” <br/>
“and were are the fangs??? Papa always told me humans had sharp little fangs” she literally was trying to stick her fingers in his mouth as she said that, making Callum splutter in surprise.<br/>
“and you don’t have dark blood… wow, dad was telling lies too....”
</p><p>
She was poking at his newly patched forehead now.
</p><p>
Callum’s eyes darted around, looking for help from anyone, and praise be, the slightly intimidating looking earthblood walked over to literally pick the tidebound by the scruff of her neck to drag her away from her squeaking victim.
</p><p>
“sorry ‘bout that.” He said, sounding both apologetic and a little fed up with his friend “she gets over excited a bit too easily.”<br/>
“….its ok…” he squeaked, still a little stunned.
</p><p>
An uneasy silence fell over the group, as no one quite knew how to respond to things. many an awkward glace was sent to the ceiling, or the floor, or out the doors into the courtyard. anywhere but each over. in the corner, Rayla had started to fidget and fiddle with her bag strap.
</p><p>
“sooo…” the skywing boy perched on the back of a chair chimed in once things had become too unbearable “what ya doing?" <br/>
It took Callum a moment for his brain to register what was being asked. <br/>
“oh, uh, OH right. I’m filling in a report.” <br/>
“about what happened?” the boy asked, hopping down from the chair back and loping over. <br/>
“uh, yeh. I.. don’t know the names of the guys in question. But I can draw them.”
</p><p>
“draw them?” the earth blood asked peering over the top of the tidebounds head to look at the paperwork that had been discarded on the table next to Callum’s chair, and the portraits that he had been in the middle of doing. 
“oh, yep, that’s them. hey, you are a very good artist!” <br/>
Callum felt his face heat up at the complement. Rayla, the only one of them that Callum actually knew in any way, had finally decided to walk over to find out why the rest of them had all gathered around, the blond sunfire trailing quietly behind her.<br/>
Callum felt his chest suddenly tighten at the realisation that he was surrounded at all sides, with his back to the wall, and his still sore voice box would most probably not let him get off more than one spell.<br/>
If any of them kicked off at him…<br/>
He retreated back into the chair more. He could feel the iron chains of the start of a panic attack start to squeeze his lungs tighter and tighter with each breath, and his eyes darted about, trying to locate any sort of exit from this situation.<br/>
</p><p>
Rayla seemed to pick up that Callum was starting tense up and was starting to panic, and quickly took action.<br/>
“hey, guys, guys! Give the kid some space already.”
</p><p>
The trio that was crowding him looked up sheepishly, and backed off, letting poor Callum brave. As Callum sat back to let his pulse settle, the earthblood glanced over at the abandoned paperwork, then back at Callum.<br/>
“so…” he started, “could we.. help you with the report? As witnesses, perhaps? Lunch is not over for another half hour or so.”
</p><p>
-
“I’m Mina, by the way” the Tidebound introduced herself as they all sat around, filling in the paperwork.
</p><p>
Rayla had poked Jimson into handing over some more copies of the incident report form, so they could all send in supporting statements or something like that. She reasoned that the administration could ignore Callum’s report, due to a number of bullshit reasons, but if several people all sent in reports about the same thing at the same time… <br/>
Well, they had less excuses that way.<br/>
</p><p>
Callum had to admit that it was a very good plan.
</p><p>
“nice to meet you Mina. I’m Callum.” He shook her hand in greeting.<br/>
“charmed! Anyway, big guy here is Arctium, mr stormy butt over there is Tobius, and you already know Rayla it seems.”  Callum nodded along, saying hello to the others in turn “ and this is… this is… um, who are you hun?”
</p><p>
The sunfire elf looked up in surprise, apparently engrossed in what she was writing.<br/>
“oh, I am Tadala, nice to meet you.” She said politely, still slightly startled.<br/>
“don’t we share a class? Literature?” Tobius chimed in, chewing on the shaft of his dip pen.<br/>
“oh, yes, yes we do!” Tadala lit up “.. am I the only one who thinks the professor is a bit of a stick in the mud?”
</p><p>
A chorus of ‘no’ and ‘nope’ came from the other elves in the room, whilst Callum looked a bit baffled. Rayla looked amused at the look he had on his face, and chuckled.
</p><p>
“He’s an ass to most people, but don't worry, i doubt you are taking zadian historical literature.” <br/>
This led to the report writing session turning into a timetable comparing and chatting about the professors session with a side of report writing, and despite how the day had been turning out for him, Callum had started enjoying the day a little more.<br/>
The chatting continued until Jimson collected the reports and tossed them out at the end of lunch, claiming that he was going to need the space for the fallout of the afternoon’s alchemy lessons.
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Runaan watched the group leave the medical centre from the roof of a neighbouring building, quickly zeroing in on the human walking in the middle of them, chatting amicably to the sunfire girl, whilst his own ward stuck her head over their shoulders to butt in.<br/>
The thought of Rayla getting close that that human, in any way, made his stomach twist. Had she already forgotten what had very nearly happened to her at the hands of that dark mage? Or that mage’s apprentice, a girl the same age as her, eyes as black as her hair?
</p><p>
Runaan had not forgotten.
</p><p>
The sight and sounds of that shadowy, Smokey abomination of a hound that had almost torn Rayla’s arm hanunted his dreams near nightly.
</p><p>
A faint shimmer in the air caught his attention, and his eyes darted to the left of the group. There was a shimmering haze about the size of large teen tailing the group, but try as he might, he could not make out anything other than it was there and it was very hard to focus on, like there was something forcing his eyes to skate over the space it occupied, and focus somewhere else.
</p><p>
Runaan did not like this. At all.
</p><p>
The group of teens all split off to go to their next timetable period, with Rayla and the tide bound heading one way, the rest of the elves heading another, and the human, after consulting with what looked to be his own timetable, shrugged and made off towards the admin building, where it was being housed. and hopefully would keep its self out of trouble. the less he had to deal with it, the better.
</p><p>
The shimmer followed the human.
Interesting. Very interesting.
</p><p>
He was not going to follow it this time tough, since a more pressing concern had just popped up, family some… less than savoury folks had just been spotted entering campus, the sort that were suspected in selling illegal substances to some of the students.<br/>
From what some of the kids were saying, the dealers were becoming very… persistent. To the point of violence in some cases. <br/>
Well, he could not let that happen, now could he?
</p><p>
Runaan hopped to the next rooftop, using hand signals to coordinate Skor and Ram into position for a surprise sting operation.<br/>
He would talk to Rayla about things later.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Chapter 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>small warning for mentions of dead fish in this chapter</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
Callum jumped a meter of the ground when Marcos dropped his id around his neck from behind him.
</p><p>
The short crown guard jumped back and laughed as Callum swung his bag at him in annoyance, before darting ahead to get the door that led up to the apartment that the 3 of them were sharing. <br/>
They trotted up 2 fights of stairs and along a landing, giving time for Marcos to fish out a key that had been provided to unlock the sturdy solid wood front door. 
It was a cosy little place, with 2 bedrooms (Soren and Marcos were used to sleeping in barracks, so they were more than happy to share) combined lounge and kitchen and a bathroom with a really nice bath attached, all looking like it had been organically grown out of the walls and floor, than had some slightly battered but still very stylish furniture and homely accents added in abundance.
The rug in the lounge was so soft and squishy, that Soren had already made threats to take it back home with them.<br/>
And speaking of Soren…
</p><p>
The blond was sitting at the kitchen table, glaring at the letter in his hands like it had just insulted him. A quick peak at the handwriting on the front of the letter, and the remains of the dark gray wax seal that was sitting on the table told him that there was a high chance that it had.<br/>
</p><p>
“stars Soren” Marcos mumbled “you dad again?” 
</p><p>
Soren pulled a face and nodded. The already shaky relationship between Soren and his father had taken a nose dive ever since the night of the assassination attempt on king harrow and prince Ezren. Viren had been angry that Soren had not supported him in the aftermath, and all the resentment between the two of them had erupted.<br/>
Soren had called viren out on the blantent favouritism he showed between his two children. Viren accused Soren of being a traitor to his family. Things had just .. crumbled from there. What made it worse for Soren is that Claudia, his beloved sister had sided with viren.<br/>
Callum was sure that one of the reasons that Soren had volunteered for this job was to get as far away from that whole shit storm as possible.
</p><p>
Marcos walked over and gave Soren a reassuring shoulder nudge which quickly morphed into a brotherly hug once he caught sight of what was written.<br/>
Callum dug the slightly squished pudding that had originally been part of his lunch. It was still edible, and Soren would probably be in need of a sugary pick up more than Callum did. It would have to do until they worked out how to get Barius’ famous pastries into zadia. <br/>
He pushed it in front of Soren, placing a spoon next to it, before throwing his arms around Soren's chest.<br/>
The watery smile Soren gave the two of of them in return was something, at least. 
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Rayla was being followed.<br/>
She was sure of it.
</p><p>
Her shadow had been tailing her since she left the library after her study session was over. The prickling, tingling sensation that told her ‘you are being watched’ had been going off randomly throughout the afternoon, but now, out in the open, all sorts of big ref flags were being waved. <br/>
This would put any normal person on edge, but Rayla was not exactly normal (hello being raised by assassins) , and she had a very good idea to who it might be. 
</p><p>
Well, 4 people it could be, and she knew a good way to find out which one it was.
</p><p>
She took a sudden left, ducking into the grove of trees to the side of path back home. She walked straight for a minute, then took another sharp left into the underbrush, then another, looping back in a widish arc until she was behind the elf following her, silently laying down her backpack as she went.<br/>
Soon she had them in her sights.<br/>
She crouched in the ferns, eyes locked on the back of her target, waiting.<br/>
The long haired elf looked back and forth, clearly wondering where Rayla had gone, the chained cuffs on her horns glinting in the dappled light.<br/>
</p><p>
Rayla coiled the muscles in her legs, counted to 3, and pounced.
</p><p>
Andromeda’s eyes went wide as Rayla hurtled out of the brush, tackling her to the floor with a thud. Rayla’s victory was short lived. Andy, as she was know to her friends, quickly flipping the younger elf over so she was on her back, and unleashed a devastating tickle attack upon rayla’s ribs, making her squeal and kick as they wrestled in the leaf litter and dust. <br/>
They jostled and tossed, each struggling to gain an advantage on each over, but in the end, Andy, who was bigger and had more experience in fighting than Rayla, won the match, pinning Rayla face first to the floor with her hands held tight behind her back.
</p><p>
“got you, trouble” Andy sing-songed into Rayla’s ear “what you gonna do now?”<br/>
“gitoffff” Rayla wined, wiggling in protest as Andy laughed “why you following me anyway?”<br/>
“wellllllll, ya see, our grumpy leader gave us the orders to keep an eye on any suspicious persons on campus. And guess what? You be suspicious.”<br/>
“rude.” Rayla grumbled.<br/>
“hey, not my idea. You can thank Cass for that.” Andy drawled, smirking. “annnnd your lovely uncle wants to chat with you about your new friend.”
</p><p>
Rayla grumbled to herself and dramatically flopped in surrender.
</p><p>
“which one?” she asked as Andy finally let her go, offering Rayla a hand to get back up to her feet. “I’ve made a couple lately.”<br/>
“the human, who else?” <br/>
“…………why?”
 </p><p>
“why do you think? He’s suspicious of the kid.” Andy said airily, making her way back towards the path. “pouty pants is convinced the boy is up to something.”
Rayla pulled a discontented face, but scooped up her rucksack and followed Andy back out into the afternoon sunlight.<br/>
“besides, there is something odd about the kid, don’t you think?” she remarked, kicking a stray pebble off into the undergowth.
“.. hes a good artist? And has something off with his voice, buttttt I can’t really say anything else. I don't know him that well” Rayla offered grumperly. “might see if I could poke some more info out of him tomorrow. If I see him tomorrow. I have no clue about his timetable.” <br/>
</p><p>
Andy just shrugged.
</p><p>
"just a quick warning, you might be in for an interrogation via grump anyway." <br/>
Rayla rolled her eyes melodramatically as two of them started chattering about the day, and of Rayla’s heroic rescue of the newest addition to the campus as the two of them made their way back home.
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
“it smells like a distillery in here.” Callum muttered “crossed with a pickle warehouse”
</p><p>
Rayla was pleasantly surprised to see Callum, and the rest of her small friend group gathered in the foyer of the auditorium attached to the small museum that the campus had, dedicated to the natural world, and all the weird and wonderful stuff it contained. <br/>
She had spotted some mounted skeletons and spectacular taxidermy in the main rotunda as she entered, but the foyer they were waiting in, along with the rest of the class, was lined with shelves full of jars of… things… that none of them could quite identify over ‘that one… it looks like a phallic fish’.<br/>
</p><p>
“well, apparently we are diving right into a practical to start, so.. maybe the smell has something to do with that?” Tobius mused tugging lightly on a loose feather in his wing. “wait…. How do you know how those two places smell?” 
</p><p>
Callum’s reply was cut off by a sharp shove in his back as a group of snooty looking older kids barged past, laughing and shearing at him as they went. He spotted one of his attackers from the day before amongst the group. Apparently, whilst they were avoiding him from the verbal lashing they got the day before, they had no problem with trying to be intimidating from a distance. <br/>
Trying. <br/>
They looked like a grumpy, mildly insulted goat. <br/>
Rayla shot the pusher elf, a hoity looking female skywing, an evil look, just as the door to the lecture hall swung open, and the milling students rushed inside.
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
The place was well lit, and set up the same way as the anatomy and natural sciences lecture hall back in Katolis collage, with desks set up on tiered platforms around the professor’s work space.<br/>
The 6 of them managed to snag a front row line and happily took their seats as the rest of the room was filled with the sound of chattering students and bags being stashed under chairs, as per the instructions on the blackboard behind the teachers desk.<br/>
The room quieted down as the professor, an middle aged moonshadow elf with her white hair done up in a tight bun made her way to the front of the class.<br/>
She took a long hard look at them all, before cracking a smile, and starting her introduction.
</p><p>
“Good morning to you all! Its good to see you all looking so wide awake. Anyway! I am professor Aylin. Welcome to natural sciences! Or natural studies as some of your timetables might say. Todays lesson is best classed as a way to see who here is in the right class, and who might want a timetable change.”<br/>
Callum shot a couple of his friends very worried looks. Both Tadala and Mina gave him idencitcal looks back.<br/>
“so, you all might of noticed that you have covered trays in front of you. Please lift the sheets.”
</p><p>
The sounds of surprise and disgust echoed around the room as the student body lifted the sheets to the sight a dead fish, sitting glassy eyed next to a glass jar, a stack of notecards, some surgical tools and a bottle of pungent smelling liquid.
</p><p>
“This class, for all those who did not bother to read the bio next to the class description on the sign up form, has a lot, and I mean a lot of practical elements to it. Elements like prepping specimens for display. Which is what you will be doing today! Each of you have a fish, and the tools to prepare it.” <br/>
She flipped the blackboard over, revealing a list of simple, easy to follow instructions for wet specimen preservation. <br/>
“next to your fish, you will find a stack of species id cards. Use anatomical traits of you fish to work out what species it is, make a record of it on the label on the side of the jar, and prepare your fish according to the instructions on the board. If you get stuck, I will be on hand to help. and yes, you get to keep the fish if you prepare it properly”<br/>
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
Callum flicked through his stack of cards, trying to match the frilly finned, sharp toothed ghostly pail fish the length of his forearm in front of him to one of the drawings on the cards.
</p><p>
The fish, to be honest, did not gross him out too much. If anything, to brought back memories of summer fishing trips with his step dad, and camping out under the stars, eating fire roasted fish and being taught dirty marching songs by his aunt whist his brother caught fireflies and attempted to help bait steal all the marshmallows.<br/>
Fond memories.
</p><p>
Tobias made a slightly squicked noise as he poked his flabby red fish with the forceps he had been provided with.
</p><p>
“what’s wrong fluffles?” Rayla teased lightly<br/>
“……. I don’t like fish……..” Tobias grumbled, giving the fish a unhappy poke , making his fish wobble in a very… suspect way. Tobias blushed at whatever a snickering Mina promptly whispered in his ear as Tadala continued to very gingerly manipulate the long snouted gray.. something onto its other side. <br/>
Callum could of sworn that she muttered something along the lines of “its looking at me…” whilst both Rayla and Arctium were both trying to play match the fish with their own flounders. By the looks of the perplexed face on one of them and the scowl on the other, they were not having much luck.
</p><p>
But then again, nor was Callum, so who was he to judge.<br/>
At least they were all still there. In the first 5 minutes of the lesson, he had counted about 8 or so of the student body, including some of the less than nice teens from earlier, slinking out of the room in defeat.<br/>
Oh, did that make him feel better about himself.
</p><p>
After a little while, he determined that the foot long white frilly thing in front of him was a cave dwelling giant betta fish. Well, he could see where the betta bit came from, it did look like a lot like the one that lived in the botanic gardens of Durain. Just bigger. And toothier.<br/>
He wrote the name in his neatest hand writing, and he started to very carefully prep the fish, using the slightly scary looking needle that that provided to very, very carefully inject the fish with the preserving liquid, according to instructions, making sure to saturate all of it's innards.<br/>
At the same time, He was having to try his very best to ignore the strange looks that he was getting from the professor, who he was rather certain her had not seen on the initial tour he had taken of the campus. She looked.. confused, more than anything else. not hostile (like some had been) just generally mystified to why he was there. But thankfully, she did not decide to ask him anything whilst he was, since he was trying his hardest not to stab himself with the needle he was using.<br/>
</p><p>
Callum was pretty sure that Dr Jimson would not be happy to see him in medical two days in a row.
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
“I never thought I would see a human in these halls. Well, a live one at least.” Aylin mused, as Callum looked at her in confusion.<br/>
“…. Live one?” Callum squeaked. she had pulled him aside as the rest of the students, including a very pale looking Tobias, all made for the door.
</p><p>
“yeh, live one, I’m guessing you ain’t been in the west wing of this place yet, huh?” Callum shook his head in response to her question. He had not really been in the museum at all, let alone the west wing.<br/>
“wull, word of warning, it’s......" she seemed to grasp for the right word "a bit morbid. Lets just say that my former boss, who I hope I never see again, like to comb through battle fields for… trophies. I hope you understand.” <br/>
Callum’s eyes went wide, and he nodded in acknowledgment. He knew exactly what she was talking about, a certain dark mage was exactly the same, until King Harrow had put a stop to it a couple of years back, something about disrespecting the dead in so. Many. Ways. <br/>
Hell, Aunt Amaya was still sending the king some very, very strongly worded letters about having to chase away 'vultures' from the breach on a regular schedule.<br/>
“good, good.” The professor's smile came back to her weather beaten face “Nice work on the fish by the way. It should come out well. Now, if you will excuse me, I need to clean out the dustbin. Young Mr Tobius did not make it out the class before he threw up earlier.”
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Aylin: how do I separate the students who actually want to take this class from those who just want an easy ride? I know! trial by dead fish!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Chapter 9</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>warning for creepy at a the end of the chapter</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The next day came with the smell of kedgeree and the sound of shouting from the kitchen.</p>
<p>
Rayla poked her head around the door to the sight of Runaan brandishing a very official looking letter and arguing with Ethari over the contents. Well, arguing would be an overstating. Runaan yelling with Ethari interrupting with dry statements and comments would be a more accurate  description of what was going on.<br/>
</p>
<p>
“soooo, what’s this about?” She asked Ethari as Runaan’s attention was distracted by the kettle going off behind him.<br/>
“some sunfire noble is trying to track down a wayward teen. And they are demanding, not asking, for Ru to drop everything and help in the search for her.” Ethari mused, eyeing the steaming Runaan sitting across from hum “and apparently they are sending some knight to help.”<br/>
</p>
<p>
Rayla raised her eyebrows. Runaan was normally the one to jump on missions involving missing kids, but something about this one had apparently rubbed him the wrong way. And he was not happy about it. Probably the fact that they had decided to tack his name onto it without his consent, and had already dispatched the person he was meant to be working with.<br/>
She prayed that this was not another case of abusive parents trying to track down a runaway. Runaan and others of his.. calibre had gotten requests like that before, and they never, ever ended well.
For the parents. Or the kids. Just messy, messy missions all around.<br/>
</p>
<p>
“it’s not helping that they, whoever they are, will not say who they are, or why the child run away. That info is arriving with the sun struck jackass they are sending” Runaan sounded venomous in his anger. “who I have had the misfortune of working with before.”
</p>
<p>
Rayla winced at his tone, but least grumpy horns was now well and truly distracted from attempting to convince her to spy on Callum. Stupidly cute Callum.<br/>
.. wait, why did she think He was cute? He was human for luna's sake.<br/>
Rayla shook that thought out of her head and fully turned her attention back of stuffing her face with food. Mina had organised a meet up for them all that morning, to just hang out or something. If anything, it was going to be a good way to get out of the house for a bit.
</p>
<p>
-
</p>
<p>
“What do you mean, you don’t have any more clothing?” Tadala gaped at Callum, who was rubbing the back of his head sheepishly.
</p>
<p>
-I could only bring what I could pack into a medium rucksack- Callum scrawled onto the small blackboard he was carrying. -between other essentials, there was not much room.-<br/>
In total, Callum had arrived to the school with 3 shirts, two sets of trousers and a miss match of pajamas and undergarments, along with a oilslin cloak for the rain and the jacket and scarf he was wearing.<br/>
And his boots.<br/>
It was getting a little tedious having to wash food and mud stains out of them every night due to certain members of the student body using him as target practice or shoving practice. Sometimes both on bad days.
</p>
<p>
And Tadala in particular was having none of it.
</p>
<p>
Which was how Callum had found himself being dragged off towards the edge of the campus, to where there was a transport service to the nearest town, intent on getting him some more clothing.<br/>
And perhaps a hairbrush.<br/>
Tobius and Arctium were towing him along by the arms, whilst Mina and Tadala bombed him with questions about colours and styles of clothing, and Rayla just trailed along beside them all, looking highly amused at the panicked expression on Callum’s face at the prospect of clothing shopping.<br/>
The fact that a slightly unseasonal cold snap had made his voice quit working (again) the moment he stepped outside that morning, so all Callum could really do was try to drag his feet as much as possible, and make sad squeaking sounds.<br/>
</p>
<p>
And then to top it all off, Rayla had called said squeaking cute.<br/>
That had not helped things.<br/>
Not at all.
</p>
<p>
-
</p>
<p>
The stage coach driver gave him a funny look, but was relatively chill about it, especially after his carriage beast, some sort of Lilly pad green, shaggy, huge water buffalo of sort gave Callum a friendly snuffle and lick. It smelt slightly like damp foliage, like the garden after a rainstorm.<br/>
The coach itself was basically the same as the ones back in Katolis, but like so many things in this part of zadia, it was all natural looking curves and what looked like live plants adding to the structure 
</p>
<p>
-You guys realise that I’m not aloud off campus, right?- Callum sat squashed between Arctium and Tobias, on a seat that was only really meant for two averaged sized people, not two skinny teens (one with wings) and their sturdily built earthblood friend.<br/>
(The girls were merrily taking up the opposite bench.)
</p>
<p>
“unless its an emergency. This is an emergency.” Mina chirped sweetly. “besides, it means you get to see some more of Zadia!” There were mutters of agreement from the rest of the assembled elves. Callum puffed his cheeks up huffily, and went back to staring out the window of the stage coach, leaning forward slightly to see around Tobias.<br/>
“and we get waffles. Or something. Anything that is not cafeteria food.” Tobius added.<br/>
That made Callum perk up a little. 
</p>
<p>
The country side outside rolled past peacefully, changing from woods to farms as they went. Before long, those rolling fields gave way to a lively town, that like so much of the school, looked like it had been grown out of the full of sights and smells that were familiar yet not so familiar to him. He flipped his hood up to hide his lack of horns and ears and piled out of the stage coach after his gaggle of friends, thanking the driver as they went. They had been dropped off at the edge of a busy market place, lit in a dappled light under the branches of the treehouses and stores that made up the bulk of the main square, and callum’s eyes were swiftly drawn to a stand full of plump, juicy looking fruit.<br/>
he made a mental note to swing back past the stand on the way back.
</p>
<p>
-
</p>
<p>
The actual fabric shopping was a fun experience. 
</p>
<p>
The town haberdashery was owned and run by a pair of elderly skywing elves, who were just as colourful as the fabrics they stocked.<br/>
From felts to silk, cotton to fleece, they sold it all in more colours than they could count. And if there was something you wanted, but they did not have, they could always order it in. the two of them had been suppliers to royalty and nobility all over Zadia in the past, and had originally moved to town to support their daughter as she went though school, and had liked it so much that when said daughter was old and experienced enough to take the reins of the main business, they happily set down roots and open shop here.
</p>
<p>
Besides, they argued, the arts side of the school was growing year by year, and growing kids need clothing regardless of the season.
</p>
<p>
And the two of them were more than happy to help Callum pick out what he needed, once the initial shock of having a real live human in there store wore off, and took the opportunity to pick his brains about fabric in the human kingdoms.<br/>
The tailor, on the other hand...
</p>
<p>
“SON OF A fLEA RIDDEN, INBRED MONGRAL! I’LL GIVE YOU SKETCHY!!!” Rayla screeched as Callum and Arctium hauled her out of the shop by her arms as fast as they could possibly go, whilst the others brought up the rear, shooting dirty looks at the tailor.
</p>
<p>
They had been in there for less than two minutes (mostly consisting of the older elf being overly sweet, almost grandfatherly to Mina and Tadala) before he spotted both Rayla and Callum, and had flat out refused to serve them, spouting comments to the tune of ‘ the filthy human’ and ‘the sketchy moonelf’, apparently not realising that the bunch of teens were in a group together.
</p>
<p>
“Rayla, cork it, we don’t wanna alert the guard.” Mina hissed, leading the group around a corner and back to the main market place, where the majority of the food stands were.<br/>
“…. S not worth it” Callum huffed to her, finally letting go to rub the spot on his arm where she had walloped him.<br/>
Rayla grumbled and muttered to herself, but gave in. Callum was right, that jackass really was not worth it. there was another tailor in town that the could go too, after all. one which hopefuly did not have a xenophobic jackass in charge.
</p>
<p>
“… er, so, before we head off again… anyone hungry?” Tobias asked, trying to bake the tention “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m getting real nibbleish.”<br/>
After a pause, the sound of a tummy rumbling loudly made them all turn as one towards a blushing Tadala.<br/>
“so that’s two for food. Anyone else?” Rayla deadpanned, poking Tadala in the arm as the sunfire covered her face with her hands to try to cover up her luminous blushing. “anyone else?”
</p>
<p>
-
</p><p>
As it turned out, none of them could agree where to go for food, since there was many nice smelling places to eat in and around the market, so after a very animated back and forth between the 6 of them, and a game of rock, paper, scissors, Callum opted to sit with the groups bags whilst the rest went to scout out the options, and to work out who would be most likely to serve him. a
After the show at the tailors shop, none of them wanted to waste any more time dealing with hot air filled bigots.<br/>
So Callum sat him self down on the steps to a bandstand, and watched the small group disperse into the crowd.
</p>
<p>
There was a light rain falling, gibing the bustling market a hazy quality, and making him tuck his well loved sketchbook up under his oilskin cloak to stop the pages from getting damp. It had been a while since he had last drawn a market place before, and like hell if he was passing up the chance to capture some nice memories to show Ez when he got home.<br/>
The graphite pencil flowed in his hand as he sketched out the outlines of the market stalls, the venders and the people as they went about there business, apparently not noticing him sitting there on the steps, surrounded by bags fabric and lost in his own little world of art.
</p>
<p>
Before long callum was so engrossed in his drawing that he barely noticed the shadow that fell over him, until a strong, calloused hand grabbed hold of the nape of his neck and dragged him back into the ally way that he had dragged Rayla down just minutes before.
</p>
<p>
He didn’t even have chance to yelp.
</p>
<p>
One moment he was minding his own business, hunched over his sketchbook, the next he was pinned to the smooth bark of one of the tree dwellings, a powerful hand clamped around his neck, feet dangling clean off the floor.
</p>
<p>
“well, well, what do we have here?” a face that he had seen somewhere before leered at him from under beautifully braded and beaded amber hair. “a bit far away from home, aren’t we, princess?”<br/>
It took callum a moment to realise that the face, hair and voice belonged to one of the sunfire generals that had accompanied Queen Khessa to the very same peace talk that the whole ‘sending Callum to xadia for peace reasons’ was first mentioned.
</p>
<p>
He had almost immediately rubbed Aunt Amaya the wrong way (via bad flirting and creeping, which had made the golden Knight herself very annoyed) and had just creeped Callum and Ezren out to the point of refusing to go near him at any point, and that was before he started to refer to Callum as princess, seeming liking the way it made Callum react. King harrow had picked up on this, making sure to stand between him and the boys, and heck, even Lieutenant Gren, who was normally friendly to anyone unless given a very good reason otherwise, was creeped out by the dude.
</p>
<p>
And now Callum was alone in an ally with him.
</p>
<p>
“what the matter” General Abasi hummed, fiery brown eyes looking Callum up and down in a way that made him feel exposed “cat got your tongue?”<br/>
Callum just wiggled and kicked, gripping Abasi’s arm in an attempt to get this gilded, armoured powerhouse of an elf to put him down.<br/>
As a response, Abasi just. Squeezed. tighter.<br/>
Until callum was seeing spots and stopped his struggles. Only then did the pressure lessen and he could gasp down air again, heart hammering in his ears. 
</p>
<p>
“now, princess. None of that.” The deep, smooth voice was laced with something mocking, “I was told, as I am sure you were, that you were not to be off the campus. And look where I found you. Off the campus. Alone.” 
Abasi tutted in disappointment, tightening his grip again.<br/>
“where are your babysitters, huh? did you leave them behind like a little fool? oh yes. yes you did.”<br/>
Callum gave no reply. The world was getting rather hazy. Things seemed to be slowing down and the black spots in his vision were starting to return. That was not good.
</p>
<p>
It was as Abasi started to speak something about misbehaving princesses needing to be punished for stepping out of line and the feeling of the clasp of his cloak being tugged on when a there was a blur of straw blond hair and silvery armour and the world went sideways.
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Chapter 10</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
Being hauled in front of the school principal was not the way Rayla had wanted to end the day, a sentiment that was shared by the rest of the motley group that was lined up with her. Tadala was staring at the floor, ashen faced, whilst Mina, Tobius and Arctium all shot each over pitiful looks.<br/>
Rayla glared as grumpaly as her bedraggled self could at her Guardian/ uncle where he was standing to the side, hoping to convey just how angry she was at the circumstances and him right now.
After a while, Professor Archie spoke up.<br/>
</p><p>
“I hope you 5 realise how much trouble you have caused today.”<br/>
He waited to see if any to the teenagers in front of him had anything to say, before continuing.<br/>
“Young master Callum, as I believe you were all informed in the introduction assembly, was not, is not, allowed of campus unless under very strict circumstances, which may I add, do not include shopping trips.” He paused again, scanning all of them with stern blue eyes. “ regardless of how good intentioned said trip was.”
</p><p>
“sir?” Tadala asked, voice soft. “ Is Callum ok? We saw him being dragged off, and he didn’t seem..”<br/>
“well.” Rayla finished. “he looked very pale.”<br/>
They had all retuned from the food carts to the sight of abandoned bags, and the sounds of a fight in the ally nearby. Rayla had bolted over in time to see a burly blond human deck a gilded sunfire general around the face with a bucket, whilst a second, slimmer black haired human was helping a very pale, gasping callum up to his feet. The boy looked like he was just about to be violently sick.
Rayla, in a fit of enraged protectiveness, had lunged at the sunfire elf, slinging a roundhouse kick at his neck. Only, she may of accidently hit his head with her heel when the blond human made the elf double over with a gut punch.<br/>
The tall sunfire stumbled, blood gushing from a busted nose, and gave her a look that read murder. <br/>
And then Runaan had turned up, like the sliver haired phantom of bad times and justice he was. With the rest of his team as back up.<br/>
And he looked pissed.<br/>
Things had gone very much downhill from there on out, ending with the 5 of them being dragged almost literally by there ears back to campus by some highly unamused assassins.
</p><p>
Professor Archie gave her an unreadable look.<br/>
“I am told that he will be fine once the bruising on his neck has gone down, and yes, his shopping has been given to him.” (Mina put her had down.) “he will not be allowed to leave his rooms for the time being, mind you, until it has been decided on how we will continue with this. Understand that he was on thin ice from the get go, and that there is a chance that he could be sent home.”<br/>
The 5 of them almost immediately erupted into protests. Shouts of ‘why’ and ‘you cant do that!’ made Runaan’s ears go back by just how loud they were, and he quickly called for quite, allowing Archie to continue.<br/>
“thank you Runaan. I said chance. The fact that it was not Callum who started things will weigh greatly in his favour, but I am afraid that not all of the powers that be like the fact that he is here, and in the long run, the decision may be out of my hands already.”
</p><p>
The looks of guilt that marred the faces of the assembled teens made Archie’s hart soften a little bit. He was young and foolish once too.<br/>
“now, as for the rest of you…. 10 hours work with the janitorial staff. Each. Starting tomorrow. This infraction will stay off the official record as long as I hear no complaints from them, understood?”
They all dejectedly nodded.<br/>
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
None of them saw Callum for a good week. 
</p><p>
None of them saw him in any of there classes, and he never showed up in the canteen at lunch, or dinner.  Tadala and Mina, who had found out that they both had a knack for sewing, both reported that they had seen Callum’s fabric in the tailor’s shop that the embroidery club was held at , with a note detailing what was to be made with it pinned to it.<br/>
But no Callum. No flashes of brown hair on hornless head in a crowd, no shimmering illusions flashing in the corners of her eyes. Nothing. It was like he had never been there before.
</p><p>
And to make it worse, Rayla was not allowed out of the house, unless it was to school/after school stuff/ training, by firm order of a still unimpressed Runaan. (ok, he was impressed at her standing up for her friend like that, and that kick was imoresive, but he was still none to pleased with her.) <br/>
Ethari had managed to bend that order a little by ‘making’ her accompany him into town on shopping trips, but it did mean that she could not sneak out after dark to slink in through Callum’s bedroom window to check on him. (and actually slink, not fall through the window like a complete moppet). and to top it alll off, Runaan had put the rest of the assassin squad on night guard duty, with orders to drag her ass home by her horns if they caught her outside when she was not meant to be.<br/>
And they were allowed to dunk her in the pond a couple of times in the process if they wanted.
</p><p>
Adding that to all of that joy and dancing, was the less then wonderful realisation that Sir creepy the sunfire elf was hanging around campus. Apparently he was A, rather high up in the Sunfire military ranking, even for a General, and B,  the person Runaan was meant to be working with to track down this missing teen that she had heard about.<br/>
Poor, poor, defenceless Runaan. Having to deal with that pompous, leering jerk on a daily basis. What ever could he do.<br/>
(Apart from complaining to Ethari over dinner about it. And pretending that one of the archery targets out back was the sunfire in question.<br/>
There was a lot of arrows imbedded at crotch level in that target.)
</p><p>
-<br/>
And all that on top of the punishment that she and her friends were receiving from the school.<br/>
-
</p><p>
“of all the things they’ve been getting us to do.” Tobius grumbled, nose winkled right up in disgust. “ shovelling shit is the very worst.”
</p><p>
The 4 other teens huffed and nodded in agreement with that very blunt, yet excruciatingly true statement. Over the past week the 5 of them had been doing everything from painting the cafeteria walls, to scrubbing toilet floors, weeding flower beds, all under the watchful eye of the janitorial staff, who were honestly happy for the help, and more than happy to delegate the worst jobs going.<br/>
Today, which thankfully was the very last day of the extra curricula punishment, the worst job going was moving a whole stables worth of manure to the compost heaps at the edge of campus, on the warmest day so far that year. They had to shovel allll the dung up into the a wagon, so it could be carted off, and then the had to shovel it allll into the compost heap from the wagon once it had reached its destination, ready to be turned into plant food.<br/>
The only up side was there was no other kids about to point and laugh. They were all at class.
</p><p>
It was a stinky, sweaty, thankless job. And it was their job for the final hour and a half of their punishment. By the time that the bell for 11am tolled out across the campus, they were all hot, sticky, and smelled like the most unpleasant parts of the otherwise very homely and welcoming stables that none of them ever wanted to be in ever again.<br/>
And to add some more bad news to the literally crappy day they were all having, the showers in the stables tack a room had packed up that morning, meaning that they would have to trudge back to where they were staying, in Rayla’s case right across campus, to wash up and change.
</p><p>
“its no point getting changed now.” Mina grumbled, trying to use a little magic to spray water from outdoor tap onto her friends “we stink all over.”
the cloying stench was sticking to there skin and hair seemingly even more then it was there clothing.
</p><p>
It took an little while, and the small group starting to trudge back the way they came, for Arctium to remember a little factoid that he had picked up on induction day, when he had taken a tour of museum.<br/>
“guys, .. there is shower room in them museum. In the basement- students are allowed to use it, even if its not wildly known about.” The rest of them gave him a surprised look “what? It was mentioned in the museum tour. Induction day? anyone?” <br/>
“… I wn’t here for induction” Rayla muttered, but motioned for him to lead the way. 
</p><p>
-
The shower room was indeed in the basement, tucked in next to a simple cloak/laundry/locker room for staff and students to use when they were working in the labs, because sometimes things got… messy.<br/>
(tour guide had mentioned something about a past incident involving an exploding dolphin. that sounded like a litral and figurative blast in Rayla's mind)
The place was not as nice as the ones in the student digs, or the bathroom in the teachers house Rayla was staying in, and the pressure was not the best, but the water was warm, and the charcoal soap made short work of the stink and any stains, and a wandering Professor Aylin had happily showed them how the fancy new washing and drying drums worked, so they were soon clean, dry, and were dressed in now dry and nice ish smelling clothing.<br/>
The 5 of them then promptly made the unanimous decision to explore the museum for the afternoon, lessons be dammed for a day.
</p><p>
-
</p><p>
“what..is that even?” Tobius cocked his head from side to side, taking in the long necked skeleton that was mounted in a galloping pose. “its all neck and legs… what’s its name?” <br/>
Mina squinted at the sign next to the leggy skeleton.<br/>
“it’s a…. ja-riff? Oh, right, a Giraffe!” she giggled to herself “hey, it looks like the camelopard from papa’s stories.” <br/>
“really now.” Rayla drawled, looking over Mina’s shoulder to peer at the coloured portrait of the animal in life. “Huh. I can kinda see it? It has spots at least…. Where did they get ‘snake’ from tho?”
</p><p>
They had wandered into the galleries for the human kingdoms, and the hall of mammals was proving to be a world of wonders. Yes, the deer and wolves and such were much the same, if with different coat colours,  but some of the larger mammals were sources of complete and utter wonder. The wonderful weirdness that was a Hippopotamus (especially its… teeth…oh those teeth) was something to gawp at. The very colourful and bloody story of how the Hippopotamus was caught in the first place on the other hand, especially the bit on what it did to one exceedingly unfortunate earthblood hunter, was a bit painful to read. 
</p><p>
“that.. sounds… uh… oh my..” <br/>
“Messy.” Arctium monotoned, slack faced, cutting a blanching Tadala off. “that sounds like a very messy way to go.” 
For an animal that looked so round and friendly, hippos sounded completely terrifying. 
</p><p>
“well” a voice drawled from behind them “those sods are faster and tougher than they appear. You should of seen the carnage when one got loose in downtown.” 
</p><p>
The teens all spun around to the sight of one of Callum’s guards, the short, dark haired one, giving them a very amused look from where he was leaning on the gallery door frame.<br/> 
“still don’t know who brought the thing into he city, but damn, there is still a hippo shaped dent in one of the inn walls near the library.” he mused.
</p><p>
They must of look like a bunch of owls, staring at him in surprise. Most of them had forgotten that there was more than one human on campus. The near constant use of illusions had something to do with it.
</p><p>
“….what?” He gave them a cheery, almost cheeky grin. “never seen a human before?”<br/>
The more Rayla stared at this human, with his black slicked up hair and slightly battered armour, the more she was getting a sinking feeling that she had seen him somewhere before, and not from that moment in town.<br/>
The Human started to laugh softly to himself as the teens continued to look like a school of surprised fish, the sound bringing Rayla out of her thoughts,  only to stop as a rustling sound started from behind him. He spoke softly to someone in the next room and a very familiar brown haired head peeped around the guard’s shoulder, confused green eyes scanning the room. <br/>
Rayla’s ears perked all the way up when she released who it was.<br/>  
“wu.. ?...CALLUM!”
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>(the inn Marcos mentioned was renamed the dancing hippo, and is still a popular watering hole for city academics and university students. )</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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